2025 Oscar Predictions: The BAFTA Drops the Nominating Juries at Long Last

The BAFTA has now made what are dramatic changes to its nominations process, and not a moment too soon. Hollywood is crashing hard, even if no one inside the bubble will ever tell you that. The Great Awokening, COVID and streaming have sent theatrical and big studio movies into an early extinction phase. Can they be rescued is the question.

To that end, the BAFTA has finally dumped their ill-advised insertion of nomination juries that had been tasked with curating the “right” selections, overriding the will of the BAFTA voters. You know, kind of like how the Democrats just did with Kamala Harris. But the only reason to even have film awards is to hear what the voters believe is the best, as opposed to what a jury with their own objectives might think. Why would anyone want to win a BAFTA under such conditions?

Readers of this site know I have been bitching about this since Day One. It robs artists of achievement and does nothing to help the film industry. So good on the BAFTA for dumping it.

They are still including gender-parity with the longlist, forcing voters to pick ten women and ten men, but they’re opting out of the jury that forced parity into the final vote. I’m all for gender parity but only if someone deserves it. Otherwise, it’s meaningless pandering that robs the deserving.

They are also adding a category for Children’s Film, a brand new category that crosses genres. In other words, Inside Out 2 can be in this new category, and the animated film category.  This includes “films of any genre with a specific inter-generational appeal to children, young people and adults.”

Here is how the new rules impact distribution, from the Hollywood Reporter:

BAFTA has also created a higher release requirement for films qualifying for best film, which must be theatrically exhibited publicly for the first time to a paying audience on at least 50 commercial screens in the U.K. for at least seven days — the equivalent of at least 350 screenings. Previously, BAFTA mandated 10 screenings per day for seven days to be eligible.

So how does this impact the Oscars? Well, it depends on what you’re looking for. Most of us tried to read the tea leaves in between their nominations, trying to guess who deserved it and who was there to satisfy the quota, never an easy prospect. Last year’s Oscars matched the BAFTAs almost exactly, whereas the year before there was zero crossover, and I mean zero.

So is it a matter of “white people gonna white people,” no matter if they’re in the UK or in America? Who’s to say? It’s probably more accurate to suggest that people ad their opinions naturally tend to coalesce to form a consensus and that consensus decides the winner. I have always found it insulting that we assume women would only vote for women or Black people would only vote for Black people. I’ve never seen clear evidence of this — but who knows?

What we do know is that Brits tend to favor their homegrown heroes in a way Americans do not. We can always count on the BAFTAs to lean into a patriotic approach to their awards that recognizes British culture and British talent as a way to fortify and build their own industry (which is the correct way to approach film awards). The Oscars do not do that. In fact, there have only been three USA-born directors to win an Oscar for Best Director since 2009.

The Academy, especially lately, seems to be more internationally-inclined rather than Make Hollywood Great Again, which is a shame for our industry here which is struggling. I’ve been saying this for a while and have been called xenophobic, but so be it. I want to award hometown kids when they make good. I don’t see anything wrong with that. But that’s not what the industry thinks, nor Film Twitter, nor readers of this site. They like the awards to be international in scope because so many Oscar watchers hail from all over the world. I don’t mind that, but I also feel sad watching Hollywood collapse.

Anyway, let’s take a quick look at predictions this week.

Checking in with my pal Clayton Davis over at Variety who just published his fresh Oscar predictions. What I like about Clayton, as always, he’s not afraid to stray from the group think and that makes him fun to read. Keep your minds open and that makes the Oscar race more exciting. Here are his five:

1 Ridley Scott — “Gladiator II” (Paramount Pictures)
2 Jacques Audiard — “Emilia Pérez” (Netflix)
3 Steve McQueen — “Blitz” (Apple Original Films)
4 James Mangold — “A Complete Unknown” (Searchlight Pictures)
5 RaMell Ross — “Nickel Boys” (Amazon MGM/Orion)

How to argue? I can’t. It looks pretty good to me. What does Mark Johnson of Awards Daily think for BD?

Director

1. Ridley Scott (Gladiator II)
2. Edward Berger (Conclave)
3. Steve McQueen (Blitz)
4. Denis Villeneuve (Dune: Part Two)
5. RaMell Ross (Nickel Boys)

They have three the same, two different. Now, let’s see what Erik Anderson has:

1. Edward Berger – Conclave (Focus Features)
2. Sean Baker – Anora (NEON)
3. Jacques Audiard – Emilia Pérez (Netflix)
4. Steve McQueen – Blitz (Apple Original Films)
5. Denis Villeneuve – Dune Part II (Warner Bros)
6. James Mangold – A Complete Unknown (Searchlight Pictures)
7. RaMell Ross – Nickel Boys (Amazon MGM)
8. Ridley Scott – Gladiator II (Paramount Pictures)
9. Luca Guadagnino – Queer (TBA)
10. Payal Kapadia – All We Imagine as Light (Janus/Sideshow)

Let’s macro out and try to look at the bigger themes. Again, just to say, not to get political but the elephant in the room is the “resistance” going up against Trump again. For Hollywood, this is like a world war. For the rest of America it isn’t. But Hollywood runs the Oscars and all of them feel “oppressed” at the idea of a Trump win. No, I’m not kidding. They do. Even though Trump represents the working class of this country — not just white either — it is those at the top who continually feel oppressed by him. But if Kamala Harris wins, for them, it will be euphoria beyond their wildest imaginings. It will be if CODA and Everything Everywhere All At Once had a baby. No, I don’t mean that in any way except in the way that it will make all of them feel un-oppressed at long last as history is made.

The outcome of the election will, I believe, greatly influence how the Oscar race goes. These awards offer a time capsule, or a snapshot, of a given moment in history. That certainly used to be the case when we could speak about a Best Picture winner and how it mirrored what was happening in American culture, experiences we all shared — like World War II. But Hollywood splintered off in two directions right around 2003 when the big budget franchise movies went one way and the Oscars went the other.

I’ll never forget talking to a famous movie director about the Oscars in 2014 and him saying to me, “Nobody really cares about the Oscars anymore — they’re like a salad at McDonald’s.” He meant in terms of speaking for America or making money for Hollywood. They were making their money — ungodly amounts — off of their Big Macs and fries. The salads were offered to show they still kind of sort of cared about quality.

At some point, the insular world of the Oscars went “woke,” meaning, all it became was a way to make history, as we’d done with Obama. That intensified as Gen-Z came of age, cancel culture flourished, and before long, a new religion was born. New rules too. Rules of language, rules of what could and could not be put on screen, how characters had to be presented. Only white people could be “bad,” etc.

Eventually, the McDonald’s side would go “woke” too and they would destroy their brand. They said to the generations of men that had made them rich, “It’s your fault we’re in this mess, now we’re going to punish you.” They blamed the audience that they had cultivated for wanting what they wanted. So they said, you can’t have French fries. Here, eat raw broccoli instead.

At any rate, here we are. Hollywood is scrambling to get back what was lost. The Great Awokening is mostly institutionalized. But the BAFTA moved ever so slightly away from it, broadened its support of movies in movie theaters and we’ll see how it goes.

As far as Best Picture, there are movies that will feed the pathology of the insular world of the richest and most privileged people in the world feeling “oppressed” by Donald Trump. So you might see a movie like Blitz resonating more. Or even Civil War. Or, god help us, The Apprentice. These movies might still resonate even if Harris wins and euphoria blankets the land. It’s not something we will know until we pass through the great gate of history in November. Please let it come and go without incident.

All of this to say that it’s hard to predict the future when it’s an open question mark and could go either way. So, just for kicks, here is how I might predict Best Picture if Harris won.

Picture

1. Sing Sing
2. Emilia Perez
3. Anora
4. Nickel Boys
5. The Seed of the Sacred Fig
6. Queer
7. All We Imagine as Light
8. Wicked Part 1
9. Conclave (Focus Features)
10. The Piano Lesson

And how I might do it if Trump won:

1. Blitz
2. Gladiator 2
3. Joker: Folie a Deux
4. Conclave
5. Dune Part 2
6. Conclave
7. Nickel Boys
8. Emilia Perez
9. A Complete Unknown
10. Anora

It’s not that different but I think it might shift things a bit — more anger in the second group, more happiness in the first? Who knows. It’s food for thought for sure. It will be an interesting year to live through in all ways.

Bravo to the BAFTA for giving democracy back to the voters.

Here are my predictions for this week:

Picture

1. Gladiator II
2. Joker: Folie a Deux
3. Dune Part 2
4. Anora
5. Conclave
6. A Complete Unknown
7. Emilia Perez
8. SNL 1975
9. Sing Sing
10. Nickel Boys

Alts: Blitz, A Real Pain, The End, We Live in Time, Queer, Hedda

Director

1. Edward Berger, Conclave
2. Ridley Scott, Gladiator
3. Todd Phillips, Joker Folie a Deux
4. Denis Villeneuve, Dune 2
5. Jason Reitman, SNL 1975

Alts: James Mangold, A Complete Unknown, Steve McQueen, Blitz, Jaques Audiard, Emilia Perez, Luca Guadagnino, Queer

Lead Actor

1. Colman Domingo, Sing Sing
2. Ralph Fiennes, Conclave
3. Joaquin Phoenix, Joker Folie a Deux
4. Timothée Chalamet, A Complete Unknown
5. Ethan Herisse, Nickel Boys

Lead Actress

1. Karla Sofía Gascón, Emilia Perez
2. Amy Adams, Nightbitch
3. Lady Gaga, Joker Folie a Deux (is she running in supporting?)
4. Angelina Jolie, Maria
5. Mikey Madison, Anora

Alts. Saoirse Ronan, Blitz, Cynthia Erivo, Wicked Part 1

Supporting Actor

1. Kieran Culkin, A Real Pain
2. Clarence Maclin, Sing Sing
3. Denzel Washington, Gladiator II
4. Stanley Tucci, Conclave
5. Paul Raci, Sing Sing

Supporting Actress

1. Isabella Rossellini, Conclave
2. Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor, Nickel Boys/li>
3. Zoe Saldaña, Emilia Pérez
4. Elle Fanning, A Complete Unknown
5. Carrie Coon, His Three Daughters

Adapted Screenplay

1. Conclave
2. Nickel Boys
3. Sing Sing
4. SNL 1975
5. A Complete Unknown)

Original Screenplay

1. Anora
2. Emilia Pérez
3. Hard Truths
4. A Real Pain
5. Blitz

How do the BAFTAs influence this? Well, Sir Ridley Scott might be due some accolades, since he never won for the original Gladiator. Conclave will obviously do very well. So far, we’re light on female directors so it will be hard for them to fill ten slots on their long list. Either way, for now I’m out. Have a great weekend.